All-Ireland MFC Final Interview with Seán Dempsey: It's not just Mick O'Dwyer's magic wand that has made the difference in Laois in recent times.
Men like Gabriel Lawlor, Oliver Phelan and Seán Dempsey, manager of the minor team who take on Dublin in Sunday's All-Ireland final, have been working at ground level for several years now.
The main goal has been to get Laois on to the top tier of intercounty football. The back-to-back All-Ireland minor titles in 1996 and 1997 signalled the initial breakthrough; the fruit of those endeavours was the senior Leinster title this summer. Dempsey, however, believes the work has only just begun.
"Teams come and go, but to be a good team you need to be up there consistently. We're trying to get to a position in Laois where every side is feared by the opposition.
"For example, all Kerry teams are given a chance of winning every match they are involved in; this is what we are aspiring to. Sunday is a stepping-stone. We have been successful up to minor, but the work must continue now at under-21."
It's this kind of forward thinking that is keeping the midlands county on the upward curve which began when their first batch of talented minors, in recent times, were beaten by Westmeath in the 1995 Leinster final.
While a return to the All-Ireland final comparisons with the achievements of the late 1990s is unavoidable, this side has a pedigree all of its own.
"Every team is different, we'd need to play them to ever really know if we were better," says Dempsey. "(This team) need to win an All-Ireland to be compared with them, but I would say this team are on a par with the past sides. On Sunday, I may have another opinion, I may even consider them better."
Since the narrow defeat to a physically superior Dublin in the Leinster final the recovery has been remarkable.
"After the Leinster final they just wanted to play a match. Get the defeat out of their system. In training that week no one was missing - normally after a loss like that you'd have to go chasing lads, especially a lot of that age.
"They made up their minds for themselves, we said very little to them."
They went up to Longford a couple of weeks later, with a slightly re-shuffled pack, and outclassed Ulster champions Tyrone.
Then came a magnificent second-half display against Kerry in the semi-finals. Trailing by four points going into first-half injury-time, Kerry full forward Bryan Sheehan was denied from point-blank range by two remarkable saves from goalkeeper Conor Gorman.
Vital scores from Colm Kelly and Chris Bergin then inspired them to an impressive comeback to set-up the re-match with Dublin.
Seven of the team are under-17 (including impressive Stradbally centre back Colm Begley and the irrepressible Donnie Brennan) and have already achieved Leinster titles at under-14, 15 and 16, so the only blot on the copybook is that defeat to Dublin. Motivation indeed.
Meanwhile, the Dublin team for Sunday's final is the same as that which started against Cork in the semi-final.
DUBLIN: K Walsh; A Downes, K Cleere, W Lowry; D Reilly, G Brennan, I Ward; B Phelan, J Coughlan; M Vaughan, B Kennedy, G O'Meara; A Relihan, K Leahy, J O'Hara.
